Main menu

The 3 Pieces Of Small Business Marketing Advice You Should Never Follow

If you own and operate some kind of small business, then surely you’d like a steady stream of new customers walking into your store each and every day, right? Of course you would. Who wouldn’t?

And a good new customer goal would be around 10 new faces a day. This depends on the size of your business., and what you sell. But for the sake of this article, let’s stick with a goal of 10.

Alright, now what I’m going to show you is some bad advice (I recently read) about marketing a small business. And then I’m going to show you what you should do in place of this advice. Are you ready?

Bad Small Business Marketing Tip #1:

You should look for the least costly ways to advertise. This is a very bad piece of advice. And let me explain why:

You should not look for low cost marketing. What you want is effective marketing. Marketing that at least breaks even, and at best puts money into your business right away.

Just like a pair of blue jeans. Do you want the cheapest pair of blue jeans? Or do you want jeans that do what you need them to do?

In fact, the only measure of a good small business marketing promotion is whether it puts enough new customers into your business to pay for itself. Sometimes, a great piece will make money on the first go. But remember, the money in a new customer is their value over a period of time.

Bad Small Business Marketing Tip #2:

You should be concerned about your image.

I understand why many small business owners may agree with this. After all, you invested a lot of money to open your business. Plus all the time it took you to get “good” at whatever it is you do. So it only seems right that your marketing image should be foremost in your mind.

Right? No way, Jose.

And here’s why:

In no way am I saying your marketing should be offensive. But it should be outrageous. It should be fun. It should grab attention, and set you apart from your competition who launch boring (me too) campaigns.

First and foremost you should care about the results your marketing sends you. So relax and focus on the results your marketing delivers, and not get so caught up with your image.

Bad Small Business Marketing Tip #3:

You should get your name “out there”. Whatever that means? No, in fact this is a bad piece of advice that will cost you a ton of money.

Never forget, the only goal of your marketing is to deliver more sales. Period. And a good direct response marketing piece does this on the first go round. It doesn’t need to sit out there for months before it works.

The important takeaway here is to test and track your small business marketing.